Greedy Goblin

Friday, August 11, 2017

How could I miss liberals among my commenters?!

I write this blog for a decade. I mostly write about games. I often write about their real world connection, how Arthasdklol's name and chat is connected to his horrible DPS. I sometimes write purely political posts. Yet it took me with complete surprise that Azuriel, one of my long time commenters is arguing for affirmative action. When I wrote about it, others came out.

How could I not anticipate this? Honestly, I always looked the liberals as fat, loud, purple hair crazies, gender study major hipster boys and crooked politicians and was absolutely sure that I've never personally met any of them. Considering that half of the USA voted for Hillary Clinton, it should have been obvious that half of the US-based commenters of a gaming blog are Hillary voters.

To explain, let me start with what "leftism" means in Europe. In short, it means Bernie Sanders. Longer: it means social-democracy, the idea that the successful and productive people should give welfare to the unsuccessful. I disagree with this idea, but I never considered these people "bad". Their politics can be presented with a simple example "the only way for an alcoholist homeless to become productive person is giving him free health care, education and housing until he recovers and learns skills". I find it wrong and believe that he'll just waste the welfare and remains alcoholist homeless. But I can't deny that:

The statement is factually true, not giving him welfare guarantees that he won't get any more useful.

There is a chance that he turns out to be a working person, there are actual examples, no matter how rare they are.

The idea is based on human nature, compassion for the unfortunate. While I fight these pre-historic subroutines, it would be crazy to deny their existence.

Their ultimate goal is to make the alcoholist homeless into a productive person, which is a worthy and good goal.

So I see the social-democrat a naive, overly social, uninformed good person. I know many and argue with them all the time. I expected the US Dem voters to be people like that, who voted for Hillary simply because she was seen the lesser evil.

Liberals on the other hand say that the alcoholist homeless has nothing wrong with him, his state is my fault, I made him an alcoholist homeless with my toxic masculinity and oppressive whiteness and I must atone to these crimes by respecting his rights to housing and nutrition and health care without conditions. They love Hillary for the things she say and voted for her in the primaries against Bernie.

This is crazy. It doesn't compute for me, how can any reasonable person believe this nonsense. Which left me with the belief is that anyone preaching it is either a liar who just say it to get elected (Hillary) or a total lunatic (the purple hair, fat feminist with a penis). I simply can't understand how can anyone remotely reasonable call races and genders oppressors after the Holocaust (which was based on the bizarre idea that the Jewish race is oppressing the German race). Since my commenters look reasonable people, I came to the conclusion that none of my commenters are liberals.

So if you are a reader who believes in affirmative action and not a purple hair fat feminist with a penis, (nor a crooked politician) please try to explain how this will lead to a better World?

PS: I don't deny that some people are racist and misogynists. But they are individuals with their individual, identifiable offenses and not speaking for their skin color or genitals. Their obvious counter is meritocracy: their organizations will fail in competition against those that welcome hard-working women or black people. There is a reason why no top company is ran by Ku Klux Klan members: rednecks wearing ghost costumes aren't particularly good at innovation.

The Neocons and the Hillary Left are two tribes of socials that are both useful idiots for the same plutocrats. Affirmative Action is just another line in the sand, not something to be rationally debated. Left vs Right in America for the most part is about as real as pro wrestling. Real leftists like Eugene Debs get thrown in jail.

It's easy enough to think real life isn't a video game, and you can't learn anything about politics by reading a WoW blog. But the US left really is a huge "friendly social guild" where you can never point out the guildmaster Hillary is a criminal, or that you don't want to be affiliated with the purple haired freaks who show up to every event. Lest you not only be "gkicked", but they'll attempt to ruin your reputation so that no one takes you along to anything ever again.

Uhm you realize the KKK leadership is no different than the politicians, educated, with money, land owning, and depend on their masses (voters, followers, etc) for stuff they would not soil their own hands with.

> their organizations will fail in competition against those that welcome hard-working women or black people.

And by the same token, an affirmative-action employer will fail in competition with a meritocratic one. So why would you care whether or not a private employer chooses to hire an underqualified minority applicant?

> they are individuals with their individual, identifiable offenses

And when you stack enough of them together into a society, that society can become oppressive.

There's a reason why preclearance provisions were included in the Voting Rights Act. Several states had demonstrated a compulsive habit of disenfranchising black people. Each time they'd come up with some new gimmick, and each one would eventually be ruled unconstitutional and struck down. Yet they kept doing it for *decades*. The racist practices didn't automatically die out. Laissez-faire didn't fucking work.

And when preclearance was struck down, those places quickly reinstated a bunch of the racist voting practices which had previously been forbidden. Because racism is *not* limited to angry rednecks dancing around in ghost costumes. It can also be found among legislators in fancy offices.

I must admit that there's an obvious libertarian rebuttal here: the black people could all move away. They could pack up their stuff, sell their homes, and migrate to places where there's less racism. But that would be a significant hardship for all of those families, and a huge disruption to the US economy. SJW liberal cucktards (such as myself) argue that it's more reasonable to insist that the racists obey the country's laws.

@Jim L: are you claiming that no one believes in Affirmative action, systemic racism and toxic masculinity or Black Lives Matter?

@nightgerbil: the name doesn't matter. Maybe they are unworthy to hold the name "liberal", but they hold it anyway.

@Anon: thanks, but I'd rather hear from one of "them" why he is one of "them".

@last anon: I don't question the right of private employers do it. I do care if universities and government agencies do affirmative action. However I'm INTERESTED in their reasoning (just like I don't question your right to lick windows for an hour every day, but can ask why)

Did I anywhere advocated for racist voting laws? Who are you arguing with?

"Maybe they are unworthy to hold the name "liberal", but they hold it anyway. " not really no. "liberal" is a blanket term used to describe the left 50% of the US poltical spectrum, but its not correct. By this arguement Bernie sanders, Bill Maher, Hilary Clinton and Anita Sarkeesian are all "liberals" when in fact they are a social demcorat, Liberal, crony capatilst and neo-marxist, respectively.

You are going to find many of your readers hold political views different to your own: I freely confess I am a "social" and the first bad habit of mine you broke me of was giving gold to gold beggers. Thank you for that by the way. Since listening hard to your arguements and applying it to my life I have found I am scammed less, abused less and feel less resentful about situations. That doesn't mean I agree with you about everything though.

I am a British "liberal" by which it is meant I'm pro-europe, internationalist, favours free university tuition for all paid for from taxation and supports a "fair" society by which is meant equality of opportunity regardless of personal start. On some of these points we differ and others we violently agree.

I SAY that the alcoholic homeless person is likely traumatised, Ill and needs help. The best chance for him to get that help and the optimal solution for his society in deciding how to deal with him is for him to be assessed, by medical professionals, given appropiate free health care and where it would help given free housing, welfare and job training to enable him to get his feet back under him and go on with his life. Not all cases will this be possible. Thats when things get debatable, but one thing should be clear, a lifestyle choice to live on welfare is a piss take of the working poor whose safety net it brings into disrepute. I am ONE major accident from being homeless and on the dole with no car and no more pc games. When the slackers convince the majority to vote to abolish welfare that list will also include no food and no health care.

In most of the world liberal does not mean what it means in the US. In the US liberal stands for social liberalism.(and even then a somewhat extreme for of it) Classic liberalism is more for state non involvement in economic decisions, and certainly not in line with socialism.

It always irks me when people use the word Liberals like in this post. I destroys the actual meaning of the word liberal, does not actually have anything to do with the majority of liberals in the world, and perpetuates the idea that the political term liberal actual means the US 'brand name'.

@GevlonMost people on the Internet calling themselves liberals are not. They are, rather, a paradoxic form of individualist socialists. I would say that their ideological background is post-modern interpretation of some very very out-of-context marxism (which itself was out-of-context with respect to actual Marx), but the thing is - most of these people are simply not familiar with either any post-modern philosophers, or actual works on "cultural marxism" (much less Marx himself) and are mostly just adopting a convenient position for the ability it gives to milk both sides.

Basically, they take "liberal" to mean "the society should work for my sake" without meaning "and i should fight and die for that, if necessary" . French revolutionaires would guillotine these kinds of people without so much as a second thought.

@nightgerbil"favours free university tuition for all paid for from taxation"

If there is ANY privilege in the world it's the privilege of the smart. High IQ is the best predictor of life time success. Free tuition means that the IQ-privileged are being given money by their less fortunate high school classmates who go to work and pay taxes. College graduates are the highest earning people in every country. The idea that they should be given ANYTHING for free is absolutely reprehensible and is a landmark of Marxist intellectuals. Post communist countries in Central Europe all have free tuition inherited from Soviet ideology.

What's more, most students in countries that actually do have free tuition (like Poland, for example) are in fact children of comparatively wealthy parents. Partially because IQ runs in families and partially because the poor kids can't afford not working.

Should every kid have a chance to go to college, irrespective of his parents' income? I agree. That's what student loans are for.

@Slawomir ChmielewskiYour statement, while being very emotional, is extremely inconsistent. I really do hope that it's a joke. Why? Let's look at it closely:"College graduates are the highest earning people in every country"Indeed, that is correct (if we won't count the rich heirs who could be illiterate and still "make" more than most hard-working college graduates combined). But that means that of all of the workforce, they are the ones paying the highest taxes. Even in countries with non-progressive income tax, someone who earns twice as much pays twice as much. So no, it's not stupid paying for the smart, it's other smart paying for the smart and also quite a number of morons that managed to sneak into the colledge instead of working.You don't need student loans to make smart people pay for their education, they do it anyway by earning more and paying more taxes. What you demand is a way to make them pay even more (since a student loan won't extempt them from paying taxes) and effectively block the people from poor families from getting any decent education since they would try to avoid getting into debt that dwarfs their entire family income.

@Slawomir ChmielewskiStudent loans are simply means of forcing people whose parents weren't particularily successful in potentially decades of wage slavery over a single poor decision (which is then likely to prevent that person in turn from having a successful family). Better to have everyone pay a smaller sum as a tax every month and have guaranteed access to higher education. If that's too unfair, there are options of progressive taxation and institutionalised charity funding

There are some parts of life in which everyone should have actual equal opportunity, not "equal opportunity to buy for money you might not have". Education is one of those parts of life

I will take a shot at defending the concept of affirmative action. To me, it is not a terrible idea, but must be used sparingly.

The best case scenario I think is what we have had in the USA as it relates to blacks. In that case, we had a literal system of racial slavery for hundreds of years, which I think even you would admit has created a disadvantage for black people, one that is not their fault.

So at the root of the concept is compensation for the wrong that was done, in terms of trying to get black people to a more level playing field. You can argue against the idea that compensation is needed at all, but to me this is a philosophical point that can go either way, but ultimately the pro position I feel is more ethical.

So now, I know you are anti-social and not racist. And maybe if the world was full of you, affirmative action would not be needed. However, the world we actually live in is not like that. People do behave in social ways and carry racist views. Sociality probably promotes the popularity of racist views, in fact. Example - lots of people tend to believe that blacks are inferior, therefore companies do not want to hire blacks because customers do not like blacks, etc. - it is a cycle.

Affirmative action is a government enforced shortcut to get enough (arguably under-qualified) black people into enough positions so that the general social view shifts more favorably toward black people, and racism slowly dissipates. It is not a terrible idea, and I can say that in the USA racism and black inequality has improved. I cannot prove it was because of affirmative action, but things have gotten better, so at least that is a positive review.

There are lots of ways to use affirmative action wrong, and overuse can certainly have negative effects. And there may be reasonable alternatives - though I cannot think of too many in case of blacks in America - they really got the bad end of the luck of the draw when being born.

Maybe the use of the "veil of ignorance" could be helpful here. Pretend you were born a black child shortly after slavery. Parents have no money and no education. Only path to a decent life is to get some kind of education for yourself, but the country is unfairly hostile to you on account of your skin color. Would you be pro some sort of government effort to bootstrap you into a school you are relatively underqualified for?

@Eaten by a Grue: that would be true right after the Civil War. But we are now 7 generations from slavery and at least 2 since the formal Jim Crow laws. Those who are now receiving affirmative action grew up in complete legal equality.

Now, I don't question that growing up in a family which is uneducated and poor because of the Jim Crow laws are disadvantaged. But how are they more disadvantaged than a white kid growing up in a trailer park? I'm not arguing to giving extra support to all disadvantaged kids, but I understand that viewpoint.

What I don't understand is that a white kid growing up in a broken family of a single mother + various step-fathers in a trailer park is "privileged" while a gay guy from Manhattan or superstar Halle Berry are oppressed (the latter just whine about how much the racist students hated her in high school, until it was revealed that she was elected prom queen).

Damn, you got me. I finally found myself arguing about politics on the internet. Your statement

> "Honestly, I always looked the liberals as fat, loud, purple hair crazies, gender study major hipster boys and crooked politicians and was absolutely sure that I've never personally met any of them."

screams of intellectual dishonesty, and I can only read it as - ‘The people who think differently from me are dumb and wrong’. You are attacking an internet identify which only exits in a very small minority, despite what [insert website] tells you. '

Why did Azuriel’s comment take you by surprise? Is it because you generally agree with his opinion, or is it because somehow a “purple hair[ed] … hipster boy” managed to hide among your commenters for so long? I think you are guilty of playing the political identity game. The statement “All alt-right’ers are Nazi’s” is just as devoid of intellectual integrity as “All liberals are fat feminists with a penis”. I’m not trying to push an ‘everyone is right’ narrative here, but when you say that the people you disagree with are somehow less intelligent you condemn yourself to playground name calling and inhibit discussion.

Here is my main question Mr. Goblin, do you think someone can be intelligent AND liberal? A 'rational' AND believe in affirmative action?

most alcoholics don't want the help. most people with any sort of addiction don't really want anything to change, until they lose gradually everything. and as with any addiction they need to suffer until they die or finally understand and seek help. by keeping them comfortable nothing will change.how the infrastructure should be made up, I don't know. I stopped drinking myself to oblivion after losing my job over it. but how people more far gone and homeless could be helped or could be of any value to society. I have no clue. but if they don't are honest in their request for help and actually want things to change for them. no matter what system we come up with it will fail and be wasted resources with exceptions.

What I don't understand is that a white kid growing up in a broken family of a single mother + various step-fathers in a trailer park is "privileged" while a gay guy from Manhattan or superstar Halle Berry are oppressed ... the racist students hated her in high school, until it was revealed that she was elected prom queen).it is called Progressive stack look here a somewhat good overview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCP-pH3JtWA. in very short: You are white, male, cis and in your prime? go hang yourself!

Gevlon, continuing our discussion, you are correct in pointing out that there have been about 2 generations since the end of Jim Crow. So this is not a bad starting point to having this discussion.

Your point about black people growing up in legal equality is true, but only from the standpoint of technical legal equality. Think of your dislike for social behavior and then consider that behavior in conjunction with racism. It can be a tough cycle to break, and affirmative action is an attempt to break the cycle of thinking others do not like blacks, therefore I will not hire them as employees or clients, etc. So laws on the books is only one factor. Societal norms is quite another factor.

Your point about poor white people being disadvantaged is not really relevant. From the standpoint of trying to correct a racism cycle, white people do not factor into it. Poor white people may be socially disadvantaged due to economic status, but that is not an ill that is trying to be remedied by the affirmative action program we have. There may be other programs that help the poor in general, but this is not one of these. Poor white people are not disadvantaged due to their race, and that is the bottom line.

So really the only question remains is whether 2 generations since Jim Crow is enough time for societal norms to adjust and for the disadvantage of being born black to be relatively insubstantial. I do not know the answer to this question, but I know things are a lot better than they used to be. I think the time to end affirmative action will come soon, as continuing it longer than necessary could be quite harmful. But I do not have an issue with it as a remedy in general.

oddly enough I would have sided you because I see affirmative action being based on dumb things like skin color, religion, sex and the like. However I just ran into an alternate affirmative action that I am thinking I could get behind. Income affirmative action.for things that assist those of low income to improve their situation.

exampleNow a black student without regard for income vs a non black student without regard for income advantage black student (all other things being equal)

alternate:

black students income vs non black students income the one with the family income near or below poverty: advantage low income student.

special circumstances:

Battered spouse who leaves abusive relationship, should be giving every advantage to get their lives back on track.

Not sure if I am willing to lump drug abuse into special circumstances.

@Craven: you are playing with words. Let's forget "liberal" and talk about "people who believe in identity politics and voted Hillary over Bernie"

And I don't think anyone intelligent can believe in affirmative action any more than anyone intelligent can join the KKK (which is "white lives matter"

An intelligent person could easily believe in affirmative action if applying "opportunity cost"

Also the KKK i think has its roots stemming back from the Civil War, White men in power with intelligence, money, land, political credits....talking politicians, judges, police, etc were the start of the KKK.

If I have the option of hiring a "green" employee with little to no experience, I will hire indigenous or female candidates exclusively.

Why? With no experience there is little way to objectively determine their future output. Also, i am relatively selfish. As a pale white male I have little competitive advantage on the diversity front. If I advocate for diversity and demonstrate its successful application, I now have a competitive advantage.

Perhaps ironically, I do not feel labels will particularly work well given how different our definitions of things are. I would support that alcoholic in your example both because I feel compassion is better in general, and also because we as a society end up paying MORE for his care later, e.g. when he ends up in the ER, assaults someone, etc. Is that Liberal? I dunno.

In terms of Affirmative Action, I'm fine with it despite it being imperfect precisely because I feel it is better than the alternative (i.e. nothing). Slavery ended quite some time ago, but the Supreme Court only ruled interracial marriage as legal in 1967 - it was outright illegal in large portions of the country until then. It was not until 1995 that 50% of Americans approved of it. The Fair Housing Act was 1968, and up until then realtors were completely fine with steering black families away from prosperous white neighborhoods and thereby deny entire generations of future wealth from appreciating assets. Nevermind all the growth that occurred after WWII and the 50's when all of this was legal discrimination.

But let's say it's been enough time and racism is dead. Fine. Are there a proportional amount of people doing the same jobs? Are 12-14% of programmers black? If not, why? Unless we posit a genetic source, it must be social/cultural. If not racism, then what? Those are both rhetorical and actual questions. Moving to a strict meritocracy before the issue is "resolved" will simply result in an entrenchment of the status quo and essentially a permanent ruling class whereby the "best" people get the best benefits, their kids get the best schools, and everyone else pounds sand. That doesn't sound very appealing, IMO.

P.S. I would never say anything is "your fault" just because you're white (or whatever). However, as a white dude myself, I have never once been called a racial slur, been forced to change my "too ghetto" name to get my CV evaluated fairly, never been sexually assaulted at a party, shamed for dressing "too slutty," or any of a long list of actual things real people in my life have endured. I grew up on welfare and in poverty in a one-parent household, but I still consider my life to have been relative Easy Mode because of my race. Mostly because I never had to be aware of it. Once you see a minority friend get snubbed in a store, followed around by security for no reason, get pulled over twice in one night, etc etc etc, you start to realize how much worse your same life could be if the melanin had came out slightly different.

Then refute that argument, there's no need to comment on their appearance as that is probably irrlevant to the argument. Don't you see the hypocrisy in claiming to care about being rational and how the world should be ran as a meritocracy, but then throwing that out of the window if someone has purple hair?

What you've done is the definition of a straw man argument, you've created a boogeyman and then made up their argument. I don't doubt that someone like that exists somewhere, but what you're doing doesn't help you at all, it just makes you look lazy and bigoted.

There any sources for this scientific consensus? 'Cause a quick search shows anything but.

The genome's been broken down, and it's been found that no genetic traits are 100% seen in any specifuc race. Factors ranging from socioeconomic to nutrition have been found to influence IQ.

I can share my experience as a white kid going to an all black school in Louisiana, to give you an idea of what passes as education in poor predominantly black areas in the south.

The school was woefully underfunded and understaffed-- they were still teaching basic addition and subtraction in fifth grade.

To say they were being set up for failure is an understatement.

I mean.... Yeah. You can say "tough shit, life's not fair", but that's a pretty bleak and close-minded view of things. I don't think making an effort to create a level playing field is a bad thing, on the whole.

marx 19th century. he doesn't invent socialism like hitler didn't invent nationalism. influences of concepts are hard to track throughout history and will wash into stories of the very distant mythical past. but he was good enough to be one of the sparks for soviet doctrine and tens of millions deaths. societies can change within decades. A current example would be comedy and how the concept of PoliticalCorrectness changed it.

What can be better seen tho is the influence of information distribution technology. Gutenberg press invention and spread throughout the 17th century made a shift. within one or two generations newspapers in the beginning of the 18th century where a new, valid and profitable business model, replacing church and their monk-hand-copied books. However one lays this out, it has changed the game. It gives every idiot the opportunity to make their shit timeless. Since 2006 smartphones in combination with brain dump services SM companies, with profit, provide. Now everything is being live commented, changing the very nature of status symbols and interaction of the current generation growing up with the spread of this tech.

@Anon, Prime Minister Sinister: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_intelligenceIt is true though that IQ explains only half of academic achievement, the other half is nurture and everyone can be improved compared to his former self. But it doesn't change the fact that even if everyone would get the same schooling and home environment, blacks would be in less numbers in high-intelligent jobs.

The scientific consensus about women is that their average IQ is a few points lower than men and their IQ distribution is significantly narrower, so more women are average and less are geniuses and retards. This also decrease their participation in high intelligent jobs and also among the very low intelligent jobs like janitor and places like insane asylum, bum shelter and prison.

@Anon: purple hair is a self-chosen identifier, like a flag. I don't need to engage someone with a swastika tattoo to know what is his opinion about politics either.

@Last anon: the reason for women having more education is fully among the impoverished. Among high and middle earner families, men are slightly ahead. However poor women can break out both because of up-marriage/relationship or simply working hard. Typical poor men just act out and end up in prison.

I do not know whether I ought to be responding to your question, as I am not technically from the United States and I do have quite the penis. By the way, you are being simplistic about the European left; on the continent, actual big-C Communists and green parties wield an influence much greater than what would be possible in the US. Especially because of how parliamentary coalition politics works.

For what it is worth, had I been eligible to vote in the 2016 US presidential election, I would have voted Sanders, then Clinton. If, in October, Hillary and Tim Kaine had been struck by a thunderbolt from a vengeful god at a donors' dinner packed with Goldman Sachs execs and the panicked Democratic Party nominated a large bowl of porridge in their stead, I would have happily voted Porridge for Prez over Trump. The man's a standard-issue tinpot caudillo, the sort any student of Iberian or Latin American history is quite familiar with.

Funny thing is, the way cognitive dissonance works, you are much more likely to conclude that I am actually a fat, purple-haired woman (hey, can't prove otherwise on the net without doxxing myself) than admit that a remotely-reasonable man can hold views inimical to your own. To this, I would gently advise you to avoid underestimating your opposition with facile ad hominem. 'Just a fat purple-haired feminist screeching slogans' is essentially a version of 'mad as a box of frogs'.

Now, to the confusion over terms: I think the label you are looking for, when you try to separate identity politics people from liberals and classical economic socialists is 'progressives.' In my observation, in modern American political idiom, that's the best you can do.

The idea that 'toxic masculinity' made some dude an alcoholic is, of course, your caricature and I do not think anyone believes it explicitly. But it is not unreasonable to imagine that if the dude turned to excess drink from stress, well, maybe if his culture had allowed him to be a bit more emotionally expressive, weep, hug, ask for help without feeling like an unmanly weakling for it, etc., etc. maybe the bottle wouldn't have been the answer. I am not saying that's a proven outcome. I am saying it's a reasonable suggestion.

Actually, you are already quite sold on the idea that culture matters a great deal, precisely because you think that Arthasdklol's performance is linked to his values. So, as the man who started the project called The Pug where a ban on things like 'lol megan fox' in chat was meant to result in better raiding stats, don't profess surprise when you see us do the same in society... just not in the way you might agree with or with the same goals in mind (e.g. greater equality). 'Lol megan fox' was a microaggression. You just did not call it that.

All this has its roots in postmodern critical theory, (which is what people are vaguely thinking of when they say 'cultural marxism') mostly the Frankfurt School, Foucault and Lacan. Old white men, not a single purple-haired well-hung lady among them. The idea, severely boiled down, is to view everything through the prism of power relationships. Every conversation, every authoritative text, every social convention both shapes and is shaped by the overall hierarchy of power in society.

Viewed through this prism, Black Lives Matter makes eminent sense. It is not a first statement, it is a response. The cops' guns, the socioeconomic indices, the actuarial stats all scream 'Black Lives Don't Matter'. 'Black Lives Matter' is a response to that. 'White Lives Matter' is nonsensical, because everyone already knows they do. It's not called into question by social realities in the same way. Denying it is like pretending an open thermodynamic system is in fact closed.

No, life isn't fair. But it should be, and we've been working to make it more so at least since the Gracchi and Spartacus. No point stopping now.

Regarding the race-IQ thing, one needs to properly understand the cause-effect chain here.Being black does not lower your IQ in itself. However, a lot of black communities live in suboptimal social and economic conditions, not conductive to proper development of children. As a result, the children grow up with lower IQ scores that affects their performance.

I know of studies that show that if you look specifically at a subset of black people who were able to start and maintain a proper family in a proper social environment, the various statistical measurements of their children (IQ included) even out with other races.

This is very much the case of nurture being more important than nature.

@Prime Minsister Sinister: Read that both the - Board of Scientific Affairs of the American Psychological Association task force http://matt.colorado.edu/teaching/highcog/fall8/nbbbbchlpsu96.pdf - and the Wall Street Journal editorial (representing the whole field, see names in text, published in the popular magazine for education) http://www1.udel.edu/educ/gottfredson/reprints/1997mainstream.pdf concluded that.

Please also note that these groups were assembled with the exact task to REFUTE the "racist" book Bell Curve that first publicly claimed that (earlier results were either limited or simply published in the academia only without reaching the public)

It's indeed true that all of the results are non-direct and cannot be direct until the genes of IQ are found, since IQ is connected to everything you do and hereditary so it's connected to what your parents do (it's impossible to find a genius who didn't do genius things and doesn't have geniuses in his family).

@Maxim: effect of nutrition did not correlate with IQ except for extreme malnutrition. I don't question that blacks from proper families have similar IQ as whites in proper families, but the causation is backwards: those with proper IQ can uphold proper families. It's likely that the blacks - just like whites will self-segregate with a middle class of OK IQ people and the ghetto/trailer park underclass of low IQ in a free country.

The decisive research would be in a not free country, where everyone is forced to have a job and uphold at least the pretenses of middle class life (no thuggery, no underage pregnancy, no open relationships outside of marriage).

A 2-hour podcast about IQ and race, by Sam Harris and Charles Murrayhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1lEPQYQk8sBoth participants are liberals and as far from KKK as one can be, both are well-renowned, even if sometimes controversial, academics.

Going back to "free universities". Yes, it is true that wealthy college graduates will usually pay more taxes later in their lives. This is why you are Marxists: you are treating people as groups and not individuals. I want everybody to pay for their higher education on their own, as individuals. You are creating "classes" of educated and uneducated and then trying to somehow balance them for "fairness". Adam and Bob receive the same education, but Adam learns while Bob drinks. After the college Adam lands a great job and Bob doesn't, now he has to pay for both of them.

But it doesn't change the fact that even if everyone would get the same schooling and home environment, blacks would be in less numbers in high-intelligent jobs.

So, there we are. Assuming the above is 100% true, what do we do as a society? The results of doing nothing or enabling a strict meritocracy would roughly be the same: shutting out black students from the best colleges, the highest paying jobs, and otherwise permanently trapping them into a lower caste for all time. The occasional genius might bubble to the top, but all other things being equal, they will be drowned out by their peers, assuming they are recognized at all given a society which has enshrined literal racism.

@Azuriel: dumb people, regardless of race are shut out from the best colleges, the highest paying jobs and permanently trapped into the lower caste.

Why pick a subgroup of the dumbs (dumb blacks) and give them unfair advantage compared to the other dumbs?

What should we do? Make sure that the "lower classes" are properly stratified into "middle class" where anyone who works hard, even if dumb or disadvantaged can be, and the "underclass" for those who are lazy. The problem is that via welfare and affirmative action we elevated the weedsmoking permanent unemployed to the same level where a hard working mechanic, nurse or cop are, destroying their status and lifestyle.

Interesting choice of words there Gob "mechanic". The number 2 fastest way to change your life from underprivileged to the middle class is through trades. If you school sucked get a trade then work on your college.

All things considered trades typically out earn degree's for the first 20 years or so.

Because nutrition is the only problem in dysfunctional families, right?It has been shown that being exposed to different kinds of psychological and social factors before the age of 12-14 can affect IQ development. This period is also longer for people with higher biological predisposition to develop IQ.

The nutrition correlation hasn't been a causal effect for nearly 80 years... since about 1940, actually.

Sure, "junk food" is metabolically suspect, and causes obesity, but that isn't slowing down the development of your brain. So this argument is a red herring in this context.

Azuriel: "Affirmative Action" is a stupid plan by stupid but "well meaning" people. But that doesn't absolve the stupidity of it. When I was younger? And I saw a black or a woman in a tech job (I've been in tech for decades.) I knew they got there by merit, and they were probably smarter than me. At the minimum, as smart. When I see one now? I assume they are "diversity hires" and tend to be more prone to dismiss them.

If you're a woman? Or a minority? ALL YOU HAVE TO DO to combat "misogyny" or "racism" in tech is A: be smart, as in... at least as smart as the other people in the field... WHICH SHOULD BE THE MINIMUM STANDARD ANYWAY. and not be an androgynist / racist yourself.

Races are different. Sexes are different within races. Some people are smarter than others. And sometimes by absurd amounts. Deal with it.

@GevlonYes and, indeed, studies that tried to correlate nutrition with IQ didn't bear much fruit (And why would it? Brain development is literally the last thing human biology would stop in times of lack of resources, given how it is our ultimately tool for survival).However, studies of correlation of psychological and social environment of children with IQ did actually confirm the existence of this correlation.

So either the link of correlation of nutrition with socioeconomic status is not as strong as you claim (does seem unlikely, actually), or there was some considerations (for example, "purity of experiment") that resulted in subjects for the nutrition-IQ correlation observations to be selected on some sort of basis, which in itself implied having similar IQ, thus invalidating the experiment by having its conditions imply its conclusion (whether with conscious knowledge of researchers of not).

Your definition of liberal is very different to mine. Liberal has been redefined by extremists on both sides as demanding that people act in a certain way. To me, a liberal is tolerant of others and believes they should be free to make their own decisions and live with the reasonable consequences of those actions.I consider myself liberal, but am also strongly fair-market capitalist supporter of a meritocracy and not in the slightest bit socialist. Beyond the humanitarian considerations, I consider efforts to promote diversity as a sensible strategy to make best use of a limited supply of labour. A little effort can markedly expand my pool of potential hires and mitigate recruitment bias to ensure the best candidates get the work.

Esteban: No, life isn't fair. But it should be. and we've been working to make it more so at least since the Gracchi and Spartacus. No point stopping now.

No, you are absolutely right. why stop now. what can possibly go wrong now?And what is the way to everyone utopia? enforced it by law like Canada with bill C-16 or bill 89. Is this the way to enforce ideology now? run to mama and cry and have her (authority) challenge the wrong doers? completely missing the point raising a confident and independent valuable member of society.

I'm not convinced. Same goes for affirmative action. any system will be corrupt if you treat people like needy and dependent humans that can't even breath unless a authority figure says 'breath in', 'breath out', 'breath in', 'breath out', 'breath in'......

@Slawomir Chmielewski "This is why you are Marxists: you are treating people as groups and not individuals."And that's where you make a stupid assumption.No, that's not Marxist. It's simply a logical and beneficial thing to do. Everyone benefit from the smart and educated people being widely available, not only themselves. Not just because they pay more taxes - that's just a simple way to show you that they would pay for themselves anyway (or die, but in that case you need to be a necromancer to hope that they would ever pay for anything), but because that's exactly the kind of people you can thank for the very ability to write here. You never paid for their education, you are likely living in another country or even continent from them, but you still reap the benefits they produce.

"You are creating "classes" of educated and uneducated and then trying to somehow balance them for "fairness"."No. You do. You lock the poor from ever getting any notable education no matter how smart they are - just because they can't pay for it without diving into a huge debt.

"Adam and Bob receive the same education, but Adam learns while Bob drinks. After the college Adam lands a great job and Bob doesn't, now he has to pay for both of them."Well, yes, it's a bit of a gamble. Practice shows that if you put enough deterrents into the system to filter Bob from it early enough (and why won't you want to filter that moron out?), Adam would be able to easily and comfortably pay for his own education, for his kids, for Bob, for his kids, and he won't even notice it. In the case of a student loan, you might find your smart and well-educated specialist washing toilets for a living because that good job is not always waiting for him at the end of his education, but the overdue payments for the loan will be there, guaranteed. And longer he has to wash toilets, the less is the chance that he'll ever use his education for anything useful - educations tend to go stale pretty fast if you don't practice what you've learned.

To summarize, the free public education is an investment, not a welfare. It's profitable for everyone personally, so no matter if you "treating people as groups and not individuals" or not, it's still a smart thing to do.